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In Denmark, more than two million of the country’s roughly 15 million minks have died out of fear of the new corona virus that has mutated and spread widely among animals.
On Tuesday, however, the slaughter was temporarily halted after it turned out that the government has no legal backing to order that minks outside the infected areas be euthanized.
At the same time that the debate is developing in our neighboring country, what is known as fur has started in the around 40 mink farms in Sweden, of which 18 are in Blekinge.
That means about 80 percent of the approximately 650,000 Swedish mink found in Sweden will be killed and skin removed.
About 100,000 minks will remain, according to Karl Ståhl, an interim state epizootologist at the Swedish Veterinary Institute, SVA.
According to him, Sweden is in a much more favorable situation than Denmark, which has had the infection in mink farms since June.
Karl Ståhl is an Acting State Epizootologist at the Swedish Veterinary Institute, SVA.
Photo: Add light Photographer Göran Ekeberg AB
– We had our first case of coronavirus in mink in mid-October, but we think we have a good control over the situation.
– It is also a very good time for the fur to arrive right now. It would not have been faster to reduce the number of minks if the Swedish Board of Agriculture had made a decision on slaughter as in Denmark.
So shouldn’t we do like in Denmark and kill all the minks?
– At present, we make the assessment that it is not necessary because we are in such a different situation.
The SVA, the Swedish Board of Agriculture and the Swedish Public Health Agency take samples and closely monitor developments. So do the World Health Organization, WHO and the European Agency for the Control of Communicable Diseases (ECDC).
– If we find something that we think may be a problem, we can change our assessment at any time, says Karl Ståhl.
Since June, 214 people in Denmark have been found to be infected with various variants of the new corona virus that originates from mink farms.
Mutated viruses originating from mink farms have also been found in Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy and the United States.
Danish minks look out of their cages before they are killed.
Photo: Mads Claus Rasmussen / Ritzau Scanpix
– But in Sweden we have so far has not detected a virus with the mutations described in Denmark and we currently have no confirmed cases in which no human has been infected with a mink virus, says Karl Ståhl.
Twelve of those infected in Denmark are infected with the special variant called group 5, which is considered particularly troublesome.
It has a change in what is called the nail protein that is found on the surface of the virus and against which the antibodies do not react as strongly as in the other variants.
Therefore, there are concerns that a future vaccine will not be as effective against this particular virus variant.
What researchers are currently trying to find out is how contagious the new variant is to humans.
It has jumped from human to mink where it has adapted by mutating. Since then, the new mutated variant has returned to humans.
– It has probably been adapted so that it spreads more easily between minks. This may mean that it has lost some of its ability to spread between humans. But this is something you don’t know much about at the moment, says Karl Ståhl.
Mink farmer Henri Nordgaard Hansen collects the minks that will be slaughtered on November 6.
Photo: Mads Claus Rasmussen / Ritzau Scanpix
That the interest is so great in this particular variant is due to the fact that it comes from mink. This is because it is especially dangerous when viruses jump between species because they then have to change to survive in the new species.
When it later returns to humans, it can cause inconvenience.
That the number of minks is so high in Denmark is a risk factor in itself, according to Karl Ståhl.
– The more hosts the virus has to jump, the more likely it is to be able to mutate.
So how worried is there to be?
– If you invest large resources in developing a vaccine, and if there are new virus variants that make the vaccine ineffective, it can of course cause major problems. No more than that can be said today.
